It tastes like turpentine mixed with vinegar. But I down another big mouthful and put the glass down before slipping around Kai to check the pasta.
“Yay?” Kai repeats warily.
I don’t turn around because I don’t trust my face right now.
“Oh, sorry.” I pump a fist in the air. “Woo hoo! Yeah!”
I hear him set his glass down. “The fuck’s up with you?”
“Nothing.” I poke the spaghetti to make sure it’s not sticking together. “I’m having a ton of fun. Aren’t you having a ton of fun?”
“Haven—”
He cuts off when I spin around to face him. I have to grab the counter to steady myself as the world takes longer than me to stop spinning.
“No, really. I’m loving it.” I push away, grabbing my glass and taking it with me as I limp over to the closest glass window. Kai’s beach house is lousy with them. This one offers a gorgeous view of the deck, the white sandy beach, the frothy waves.
My stomach churns.
While I was sleeping in my car, counting quarters for gas money, he was vacationing in a fucking palace by the ocean. My green-eyed boy has become a stranger with money, and I’m simply the embarrassing reminder of where he came from.
No wonder he never replied to my letters.
His hand is warm and large and heavy when he lays it on my shoulder. “Are you angry with me, or something?”
“Why’d you think that?” I huff out a quiet laugh. “It’s not like you forgot about me the moment you moved out of Riverside or anything.”
He tries to turn me to face him, but I lock my knees and refuse to shift. Wine sloshes up the side of my glass, but thankheavensit doesn’t spill on the exquisite hardwood floors.
“Forgot you?” His voice is a few octaves too high. Way too defiant. “I—that—you can’t say that.”
“You’d prefer abandoned? Rejected?” I shake my head, swallowing down another mouthful of the awful wine. In its defense, it doesn’t really taste that awful anymore. Guess my taste buds have shut down in self-defense.
I throw him a sidelong glance when he doesn’t reply straight away.
Like me, he’s staring at the ocean. “I wasn’t allowed anywhere near the woods. And even if I was, I didn’t have the time. My parents forced me to take extra classes to get my grades up. Put me on the football team.”
“You could have invited me to one of your games. Could have invited me to your house. Think I didn’t want to see your fancy mansion in the hills?” I turn to him, my hand on the cool windowpane. “The moment you got money, everything changed.Youchanged, Kai. Soon as you moved to Hillside, I might as well have been living on a different planet. And I guess you didn’t like the idea of inviting E.T. over to your house.”
He drops his head, staring at his still-full glass of wine. “It wasn’t like that.”
“Yeah? So you weren’t ashamed of me?”
Kai shakes his head. Not denying it, but like he’s regretting it. “I…”
I slap my hand against the glass. “What, Kai?”
He flinches, but stays quiet as his eyes flick back to the ocean.
I hear my own breathing. Short and harsh and hot through my flaring nostrils, so I lean back on my heel and take a leisurely sip from my glass.
Hmm. Weird how all the acidity seems to have vanished. Guess this bottle just had to air out a bit. Because that’s what happens, isn’t it? Shit gets pent up, it goes rotten. Air it out, and all the stale resentment dissipates.
Damn, this booze is turning me into a Poe wannabe.
Is it the wine, or is it justtime?
Time to get answers to the questions I’ve spent so many sleepless nights contemplating. No matter what he says, anything can be better than the bullshit I’ve come up with.
